


We Gather On This Day

by tjs_whatnot



Category: Island of the Blue Dolphins
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-08-07
Updated: 2014-08-07
Packaged: 2018-02-12 03:54:32
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,114
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2094735
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tjs_whatnot/pseuds/tjs_whatnot
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sometimes it's not the tribe you are born into, it's the one you create when all is lost.</p>
            </blockquote>





	We Gather On This Day

**Author's Note:**

  * For [karrenia_rune](https://archiveofourown.org/users/karrenia_rune/gifts).



> Thank you so much for the beta, Redsnake05!

We, the daughters of Karana, gather together to remember Mother. We were not born to her, but she is all we know. When we think of family we get flashes of feathers like ours, beaks like ours, yet our wings are not the same. Theirs were long and powerful, and ours, short and weak. 

But when we try to remember, all we remember is hands, so gentle despite the calluses and rough use. We remember her smile as she twittered her song. We returned it with one of our own; until eventually the songs became the same, neither what was hers alone or what had belonged to us, but Ours.

That is what family means to us.

There was a time when we did not know why she did this to us, why she spared our lives and healed our wounds just to clip our wings and keep us from what we were born to do, fly. But then as many suns passed and no one came for her, no one came for us, we understood. Somehow her wings had been cut as well. We were all broken and had lost our flock. The second time she cut our wings, she didn’t need to, we would have stayed anyway.

By the time our wings grew out for the third time and teased us to fly, to soar, she was no longer who she had been, she no longer believed in keeping things close against their will, and she hadn’t yet learned what our will had become. She thought we would leave her like everyone she knew had done. Yes, we did fly, we did soar; we are birds, it is who we are. But we did not go far, did not leave her. We built nests in the trees above her home and we continued to sing our song with her. We continued to gather in the palm of her hands, to coo as she stroked our feathers with her gentle yet calloused hands.

She was the only family we knew. 

>>>>>>>

 

We did not have a word for her in our raft, our tribe. There had never been one like her before. One who walked upon the land yet did not seek to destroy, war with or consume all of the sea. Though she wore pelts that belonged to us, we could tell she had changed, was different. Even before she nursed me back to health and asked nothing from me, instead offering me her companionship and continued care. 

She called me Won-a-nee and us "otters;" those were her words, belonged to her tribe. So we adopted another of her tribe’s words and called her Grandmother. From what we could observe, Grandmother meant wisdom and experience. It meant compassion and unconditional support. It meant Family. 

That's what she was to us. 

>>>>>

I do not know if she ever knew the truth about me, what I had done. It is so long ago and so much has changed that I hardly remember myself. We were both so different then. 

I was a predator, like her. We, neither her tribe nor my pack, had natural enemies. We left each other alone for the most part. Occasionally we stole their kills, and sometimes they interfered with our hunt, but we never hunted them and they likewise never harmed us. 

Then the bad times came. Her tribe left, leaving only her and the boy behind. The animals fled, even the otters were gone. We were so hungry. We begun to fight amongst ourselves and the pack begun to question me as their leader. 

The boy was alone, practically defenseless, and so delicious smelling. 

I could spin a tale and say it was not on my orders, that my pack acted on their own, but I am here to honor my sister. It was, after all, she who taught me about honor, about the different ways and levels of earning and showing respect. So, to lie now, here, no matter how badly I wish to, would dishonor her. 

They saved the heart for me. It is our pack tradition. The leader consumes the heart of the prey, and from them, their strength, their knowledge and their passion. 

I was not expecting to also gain his loyalty, devotion and sense of family. It had never happened that way before. For the rest of the pack, the feast of the boy made them blood thirsty. They craved the girl. My soul was at war with my heart. As a dog, a predator, I wanted her as much as the rest. Yet, with her brother's blood pumping in my veins, his heart in mine, I felt an overwhelming need to protect her. 

I was the leader though, anything but aggressive stalking of our prey would be seen as weakness. I couldn't be weak. Weakness is death in my pack. 

Still, I was not keen to find her vulnerable again since I could now feel her brother's blood in my veins. I was relieved when she took it upon herself to defend herself, to make and learn how to use weapons. I knew it was against her tribe’s beliefs, but her tribe was no longer here. There was only us. 

I also knew there would come a day when she came for me, or worse, another of the pack. 

I was not prepared, and could have never predicted what she did when she had me in her grasp. I imagine she barely knew what she was doing herself. 

If she ever discovered my secret, I believe it was then, while I lay dying in her arms and she could have easily killed me. Yet, there was a look in her eye, as if she understood; saw past me and saw her brother, her only remaining companion. 

As I bled and continued to walk the thin line between life and death, I felt the boy in me grow stronger and the dog flicker and fade. She brought me back to life and then allowed me to go. It was impossible to do so at that point. I was already her brother. She just didn’t know it.

Neither did my pack. 

I felt them stalking her, stalking us, could hear them bay at night, taunting me. I knew I would have to stand up to them, proclaim my intentions to stay with her, to betray who I had been. I didn’t mean for her to witness this battle, but I’m glad she did, glad she understood. I could not go back, I would not leave her.

From that day to the day I died, many moons after, she was my sister. My family. My pack.


End file.
